Let's see.. Well, I'm afraid of swimming if I can't see the bottom. I'm not that scared of heights, but if i'm looking down from a tall building or something, I always get an urge to jump down. And I can't close my eyes in the shower for more than a couple of seconds. I always picture like a giant spider with a Facehuggerish head and hundreds of tiny tentacles that crawls into certain areas of my body.And I often think about insects and such laying eggs inside my body when I sleep. And tapeworms.I don't like most even numbers, and a few odd numbers. I like 8 better than 9, but 10 better than 8. It's weird... And my favorite number is 5. So yeah.Oh, and bears. Bears scare the shit out of me.

I only have one real phobia, but that's a tough one: Butterflies. Compared to normal fears a phobia is different... you totaly loose control over your mind and body.

Sure, I know those animals do not hurt anybody and it sounds funny to most people who hear about it. But they scare me more than anything else. I have nightmares about them, when I am forced to look at them I feel like I see a bunch of entrails and when one of them is in the same room I freak out and run - or cower on the floor if I cannot reach the door. For a long time it was nearly the same with similar looking insects like moths, but this got better.Two years ago I decided to do something about it and visited an expert for animal phobia. I am still impressed about the fast progress we made, I can highly recommend a therapy like that! We only worked with pictures and an artificial butterfly, but it was a big help. Now I can handle a white butterfly or moth flying by and can watch them from the distance without panicing.

But I still have this terrible phobia about peacock butterflies and similar looking ones.

What's interesting about this is how the phobia developed. I remember having no problems with butterflies as a little kid. In Kindergarten I could hold them in my hands. Something must have happened after that, because at the age of 6 I suddenly was afraid of many things that have artificial "eyes" on them: peacock feathers, wood grain on our kitchen table, some of my Grandmother's dish, creatures in children's books with many eyes. And butterflies were the most horrible thing for me. Most of those fears disappeared when I grew up, but the butterfly problem stayed and even got worse.Maybe I developed this phobia because of an eye surgery I had at the age of five. It fits... maybe this was the way my subconscious dealt with it. I never was afraid of real eyes though. And about the same time I remember discovering a bunch of dead butterflies in our house which was a big shock for me.

No, I won't add more body shapes, band shirts or sports trikots. Really.

I once had a nightmare when i was 3 i guess about Some Mannequins who came alive and tried to kiss and touch me. Since than i'm afraid of them. I still try to not show it to others but i still prefer avoid them.

I used to have a phobia for clows but that one is already over.

Also when i was 2,3 I was always afraid of the shadows. When i looked to them i saw a jester, the Dinosar of Toy Story and some other stuff in it and was afraid that they would give me nightmares. So i always slept with the light in the hall on.

I'm still a bit scared of the time around 0:00pm. until 3:00pm.I will always think that i will see That girl from the Exorcist and other creepy stuff.

What's interesting about this is how the phobia developed. I remember having no problems with butterflies as a little kid. In Kindergarten I could hold them in my hands.

I can relate to this, when I was younger I used to be obsessed with spiders, I had books and books on them, I loved watching documentaries, I wanted a pet tarantula. Then when I was about fourteen I had a dream that I was being chased by one of those bird-eating spiders that can jump huge distances - except I later found out that this one could fly, too - and when I woke up my entire brain had changed, I couldn't even look a spider (especially the face - there's something about the eyes that really bothers me) without practically having a panic attack. I'm better these days, I can catch house-spiders to put them outside and I only feel slightly creeped-out and goosebumpy, but I remember once in school I accidentally saw a picture of one in a science textbook and I screamed and flung the book away, while the rest of the class was quietly turning to the correct page. Oops.

I also think the word "phobia" gets used far too often. Lots of people are scared or creeped-out by lots of different things, but if you've got a genuine phobia then you damn well know about it - it's a real primal, full-blown panic feeling. Which can be mighty embarrassing as well as unpleasant on its own terms.

Joker wrote:

Well, I'm afraid of swimming if I can't see the bottom.

I'm not a bad swimmer and normally depth doesn't bother me, but for some reason even the thought of swimming over one of these makes me feel a bit squirmy inside.

I am petrified if someone throws up in front of me.I legitimately have anxiety when either someone throws up, or if I am about to throw up.It all started when I was maybe three. (my earliest memory)I had that stomach virus...where anything you eat or drink...comes right back up...and it was so bad to the point where I had to be hospitalized.So now, if someone is about to vomit, I run as fast as I can. I hate the sight, the smell, the way someone sounds when it happens...I can't deal with it.

And I don't really care if you think I'm strange, I'm not gonna change, and I don't give a damn about my bad reputation! -Joan Jett, Bad Reputation 1980

I wouldn't call it a "phobia" exactly, but heights and the ocean freak me out. I don't like heights becuase of the many dreams I've had in my life involving falling for what feels like forever. Now the ocean bugs me becuase of how fuckin' huge it is. I enjoy the beach and can swim, but once land is out of sight and all there is too hear is the ocean swaying back and forth, then there's a problem. Not being able to see whats below me doesn't help either. The scenes similar to this in Finding Nemo, where Dory and Marlin are swimming towards, what appears to be nothing but silence and utter blackness are the ones that come to mind when I think of the ocean. Also, Jaws is still the scarriest film I've ever seen and it deffinitley had something to do with my views on the ocean...

Topic about phobias, huh? I have a lots of them.... First, spiders, and other bugs, although I think I'm slowly curing myself from arachnophobia... Although bigger ones still make me scream like a little girl... Also Wasps... God, I hate those stripped, buzzing fuckers, in my life I got stung twice....

I also share Jareen's scare of mannequins, there's always something disturbing about their faces.....

Also, some street artists freak me out... I'm not talking about mimes, or clowns (although they also terrify me ), but about so called "Living statues". They look like real ones, but when they suddenly move *shiver*..... Also some performers wear long monk-like hooded robes, in which you can't see their faces, they litteraly look like Slenderman meets the Dementors from Harry Potter. Not to mention long staves in their hands and a bell they ring loudly, which is just really annoing.... I keep away from those guys, unfortunately, they swarm Warsaw's Old Town like a vermin.....

Also, big open spaces make me feel incomfortable, it's not that I have a severe Agoraphobia, It's just, when you're alone in a field, and there's nothing around in a wide radius, you just stare at horizon, and it makes you feel like you're suspended in some kind of void..... I feel much safer surrounded by tall buildings.....

i am scared bywasps: i once go stung on my arse...not nicescary movies: i have never gotten through a horror movie, the dementors, weeping angels and the angler-fish from finding nemo made me shit myselflosing things: i hate the ideas for losing things, if i can't find my phone i will actually have a panic attack.

Eggy & bellaX: wow, only twice? Those, like Eggy calls them, fuckers stung me way more often. And when its about bees I could not count...

What on Earth have you been doing to get stung by that many bees, raiding their hives for honey with your bare hands or something? Bees only ever sting people as a last resort when they're threatened, because the sting rips out the bees innards when it pulls away and it dies a horrible death. Wasps sting on a whim, sure, but bees are harmless.

Holy shit, i just screamed louder than i think i ever have.On a less pants-shittingly terrifying note, i think i should expand more on my first post:

Wade Zabel wrote:

Rodents and spiders. Also, Im not scared of clowns, i just wish they would die in a fire.

For rodents, i have a full blown whatever rodentphobia is called. (normally i would look i up, but im really not in the mood) For example, if i see a rat on a trail, ill run screaming in the other direction and never walk back on the trail. I get scared whenever a see a mousetrap, just because i know rats exist. Also, the fact that rats swim up your pipes and into your toliets makes it impossible for me to take a shit outside my house, and even when i do it in my house, im still scared shitless and ususally do it squatting so rats cant bite my ass. Sereously, fuck rats with a 24-inch pole up their cock hole THOSE FUCKING PICES OF SHIT BURN IN A FIRE ILL KILL YOUR LITTLE RAT FAMILES YOU FUCKING BASTARDS!! (...sory about that)

I've had pet rats in the past, they're completely brilliant creatures in every way. Super-intelligent and friendly. How could you hate such adorable little things?

Seriously, you're more likely to get trampled to death by Elvis on a woolly mammoth than you are to get bitten by a rat that's just crawled out of your toilet. A rat crawling out of a toilet in a country with sanitation is something 99% of people will never experience in the first place, but even if it did, the last thing it's going to do is attack a human. Non-domesticated rats are timid as hell. Being afraid of rats themselves is one thing, but being afraid of them doing something for which there is no evidence at all that they have ever done is quite another.

bellaXraven wrote:

But they were wasps...

I'm sure they were, I was talking to Till. Like I said, I know wasps will sting without provocation. Bees won't, though, but Till claimed he had been stung by bees more often than he had been stung by wasps.